Picking up those brushes again.

Hi and welcome to the occasional mutterings of Dave Doc, a military modeller and some time gamer. Gaming and model making has given me a real education, History & Geography(obvious really), Artistry, Politics, Economics, Logistics, Project Management -you try building miniature armies without the last 3.

I will use the blog to record my creations & the odd occasion I actually do some gaming.

I have always been inspired by the aesthetic side of gaming. Playing on well constructed terrain using excellently painted units is always a joy.

Tuesday, 2 May 2017

Gaming - The Battle of Noyers - Normandy 1944

The last weekend saw another of the regular large all day games put on by the loose association that is the Old Guard Wargame "Club" at Scruton just outside Northallerton. We have been taking in turns to run various games for people and this time James (The Mad Tin Hatter blog) was up.

James was bringing his wonderful 15mm WW2 Normandy collections - he has been really dedicated to it and has produced some fine models and figures. He also provided a write up of the battle plan and various OOB. The rules were to be Flames of War version 4 - with a few minor tweaks and mods by James.

Classic Normandy - advancing through the cornfields

The battle was one that James's grandfather fought in and was part of an overall campaign that will be visited by the sound of it.

We had a table 11 foot by 6 to play on - 6 of us would be British (4 infantry/tank sections - 1 Funnies , and one Command and Support elements ) and we would be playing down the length of it . A main change was that James was running the Germans on his own with hidden deployment - we would have to spot things . As we captured various points represented by green tiddly winks a roll on a random event table would take place - sometimes good - sometimes bad! - but it made for a great game ...

The attack started with two platoon and tanks - with Martin on the east and Steve on the West attempting to capture the village and the railway line. Myself and new boy Angus would bring on the the other two infantry /tank sections to push through . Stuart had the various Funnies - Crabs, Crocodiles and Petards. for dealing with stubborn resistance and difficult jobs. John sat at the back polishing his mortar ammunition and pleading for more artillery support...

looking toward the first British objective

The railway station was objective 2

Objective 3 at the far end the town of Noyers itself

Jump off east side - Martins

Jump off west side - Steves

German in the village make themselves known

A sharp eyed Sherman gunner spots a hidden Stug and brews it up... and start to flank the village

On the east side the Brits chase out Germans from the woods.

A Panther lurks behind the railway station - it would do bloody murder...

More Germans behind the railway line - the AT gun was manned until the very end - they guy deserved a medal...

Brit "Funnies" enter the fray...

The Panther knocks out its first victim

Brits continue the advance through the woods into the cornfield - a heavy MG emplacement is spotted on the hill

The first objective is captured at bayonet point

Another Stug appear , but quickly falls to allied fire. The Panther knocks out more tanks , and starts to retreat as it gets flanked.

Having cleared the first two objectives my guys powered through into the cornfield and towards the woods in front of the main town. Johns duff dice would soon arrange a Nebelwerfer barrage on them.

A classic Normandy view i think

The Germans had bugged out back toward the town - the allied armour pushed on - we were running short of infantry. The Panther lurks down the road - occasional kill another tank! Everything we threw at it bounced off.... until a sherman gor brave and lucky - ! - but that was the high water mark.

Busy table shot

Minefields are discovered just beyond the cornfield - more delays...

They are breached by the flail tank and we advance again into HMG fire -

While i did not not shoot much and what i shot at I missed - I covered a lot of ground , and managed not get anything killed - well only bailed out! and we could recover that!

At this point we had played over 10 turns - and 6 hours gaming - it was the British high water mark - just in front of the main town . British Anti tank assets were deploying for the counterattack . the British infant was tired - and most of the Fireflies has been knocked out by the bloody Panther!

We called it there - and all look forward to the "assault" on Noyers itself in the future.

L-R Angus, Steve,Stuart, John , James - Martin - Happy Gamers all.

We had to use bits of terrain from a number of us - and overall it it worked - I would like to see about getting a lighter green mat - so i will have a look at one from Deepcut or Tinywargames i think as it will help things blend in better

Only two of us had played Flames of War - James and Steve - but we all were picking up fairly quickly - James only had to refer to the rules once all day. I have played a fair few WW2 games in my time - and while it was new rules - it did give a good feel and seemed to work well - and it was FUN!

A number of us are at Partizan where I am putting on another Sudan game - we also have anothe rfull days game planned mid June - Martin is going to run a VBCW game - The Battle for Scruton - Country toffs v workers by the look of it! - looking forward to the games..

Great looking game and a grand scale ! A good collection of WW2 I like FoW and agree it works well but can be slightly complicated. I'll try and get across sometime and will catch up at Partizan as we are coming for the day 😀

Yeah, these were using the new v4 rules and they worked really well for this. Gone from a 300+ page rulebook to 100ish with lots of good examples. A lot of the things that slowed things down but added nothing are gone. Good set for games of this size and style.